A Cold Day for Murder

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When is the next book?

By
kevinplee@hotmail.com
on
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Dead in the Water

A Kate Shugak Novel, Book 3

By:
Dana Stabenow

Narrated by:
Marguerite Gavin

Length: 5 hrs and 48 mins

Unabridged

Overall

4.5 out of 5 stars
3

Performance

5 out of 5 stars
3

Story

4.5 out of 5 stars
3

Once, Kate Shugak was the star investigator of the Anchorage D.A.'s office. Now she's gone back to her Aleut roots in the far Alaska north - where her talent for detection makes her the toughest crime-tracker in that stark and mysterious land.

A Fatal Thaw

By:
Dana Stabenow

Narrated by:
Marguerite Gavin

Length: 6 hrs and 7 mins

Unabridged

Overall

4 out of 5 stars
4

Performance

4.5 out of 5 stars
3

Story

4.5 out of 5 stars
3

On her homestead in the middle of twenty million acres of national Park, Aleut P.I. Kate Shugak is caught up in spring cleaning, unaware that just miles away another Park rat is planning a massacre. When the sound of gunfire finally dies away, nine of his neighbors lie dead in the snow.But did he kill all nine, or only eight? The ninth victim was killed with a different weapon. It’s up to Kate and her husky-wolf sidekick Mutt to untangle the life of the dead blonde with the tarnished past and find her killer.

Play with Fire

A Kate Shugak Novel, Book 5

By:
Dana Stabenow

Narrated by:
Marguerite Gavin

Length: 7 hrs and 21 mins

Unabridged

Overall

0 out of 5 stars
0

Performance

0 out of 5 stars
0

Story

0 out of 5 stars
0

A mushroom hunting foray turns gruesome when Kate Shugak stumbles across a burnt, decaying corpse amid a grove of morels. Was the deceased the hapless victim of last year's forest fire? Why has no one reported him missing? And why wasn't he wearing any clothes? Absent evidence of foul play, the troopers are inclined to call it death by misadventure; Kate's instincts suggest otherwise, leading her down a path that requires her to confront issues of community, faith, and free will.

A Cold-Blooded Business

A Kate Shugak Novel, Book 4

By:
Dana Stabenow

Narrated by:
Marguerite Gavin

Length: 6 hrs and 55 mins

Unabridged

Overall

4 out of 5 stars
3

Performance

4.5 out of 5 stars
3

Story

4 out of 5 stars
3

A string of drug-related accidents at an oil company's rig in the Arctic Circle forces Kate Shugak to go undercover to scope out a cocaine connection along the TransAlaskan Pipeline. She's out to ID a major deal and shut down his operation. Of course, the deal has other ideas....

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By:
Ann Cleeves

Narrated by:
Kenny Blyth

Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins

Unabridged

Overall

5 out of 5 stars
14

Performance

5 out of 5 stars
12

Story

5 out of 5 stars
12

When an elderly woman is shot in what appears to be a tragic accident, Shetland detective Jimmy Perez is called to investigate the mystery. The sparse landscape and the emptiness of the sea have bred a fierce and secretive people. As Jimmy looks to the islanders for answers, he finds instead two feuding families whose envy, greed and bitterness have lasted generations. Then there's another murder and, as the spring weather shrouds the island in claustrophobic mists, Jimmy must dig up old secrets to stop a new killer from striking again....

The Night Stalker

Detective Erika Foster, Book 2

By:
Robert Bryndza

Narrated by:
Jan Cramer

Length: 9 hrs and 38 mins

Unabridged

Overall

4.5 out of 5 stars
193

Performance

4.5 out of 5 stars
176

Story

4.5 out of 5 stars
175

In the dead of a swelteringly hot summer's night, Detective Erika Foster is called to a murder scene. The victim, a doctor, is found suffocated in bed. His wrists are bound and his eyes bulging through a clear plastic bag tied tight over his head. A few days later, another victim is found dead in exactly the same circumstances. As Erika and her team start digging deeper, they discover a calculated serial killer - stalking their victims before choosing the right moment to strike.

5 out of 5 stars

When is the next book?

By
kevinplee@hotmail.com
on
08-06-2016

Publisher's Summary

Eighteen months ago, Aleut Kate Shugak quit her job investigating sex crimes for the Anchorage DA’s office and retreated to her father’s homestead in a national park in the interior of Alaska. But the world has a way of beating a path to her door, however remote. In the middle of one of the bitterest Decembers in recent memory ex-boss — and ex-lover — Jack Morgan shows up with an FBI agent in tow. A Park ranger with powerful relatives is missing, and now the investigator Jack sent in to look for him is missing, too.

Reluctantly, Kate, along with Mutt, her half-wolf, half-husky sidekick, leaves her wilderness refuge to follow a frozen trail through the Park, twenty thousand square miles of mountain and tundra sparsely populated with hunters, fishermen, trappers, mushers, pilots and homesteaders. Her formidable grandmother and Native chief, Ekaterina Shugak, is — for reasons of her own — against Kate’s investigation; her cousin, Martin, may be Kate’s prime suspect; and the local trooper, Jim Chopin, is more interested in Kate than in her investigation. In the end, the sanctuary she sought after five and a half years in the urban jungles may prove more lethal than anything she left behind in the city streets of Anchorage.

State of suspense: listen to more Alaskan mysteries in the
Kate Shugak series.

Great "read".

Thoroughly enjoyed learning the correct pronunciation of all the Alaskan geography and Aleut names.

Was downloading the next book before I even hit the last chapter.Thank for a great time.

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Overall

4 out of 5 stars

Performance

4 out of 5 stars

Story

4 out of 5 stars

SMH

01-09-2016

Gritty Realistic

After living in Alaska for nearly 40 years and being away for 15, I enjoyed a visit back home through this book. That being said, the realism of the Alaskan Native struggle saddened me again as the author unfolded the story very well,I think, from the perspective of Kate Shugack,a well educated,strong Alaskan Native woman. I found the story gripping, exciting, and true to the Alaskan life style of the "bush" areas. I loved the characters who were so well developed that I thought I may have known some of them. The author is very well acquainted with what it means to be Alaskan, Native or white.If you are interested in a good mystery, in an exotic setting, this book is for you. Get your parka on, curl up to a warm fire, and enjoy a great, gritty, fast paced Alaskan adventure!

32 people found this helpful

Overall

4 out of 5 stars

Performance

4 out of 5 stars

Story

4 out of 5 stars

Tracey

02-01-2013

You never go wrong with a Stabenow novel

I have been waiting until all Stabenow's books are in audible format, so I have "read" some of the latter books before this one. This book was not as complex, but it is great to get to know the characters from the beginning. Gavin's performance is, as usual, top notch.

One inconsistency, though, is the variation in the story of the how Kate received her throat scar. In "Though Not Dead", the 4 year old was a random victim, whereas in this (first) of the series, the victim was the child of the perpetrator. This does not diminish from the impact of the book, however -- it must be difficult to keep facts consistent over the course of more than a dozen novels.

The best character in the story is Alaska itself. Stabenow takes you there and it is a fun trip. Also love the partnership between Kate and her dog, Mutt.

Please make ALL of Stabenow's books available!

35 people found this helpful

Overall

5 out of 5 stars

Performance

5 out of 5 stars

Story

5 out of 5 stars

Rusty

29-08-2016

Kate & Mutt Kick Ass

When I recently listened to A Cold day for Murder for about the 10th time, I realized that Dana Stabenow is simply a genius. The character of Kate is strong, engaging, self-sufficient, funny and relentless. She may be burnt out from 5 years of protecting Alaskan children from physical & sexual abuse, but she isn't whining or looking for a man to rescue her.

Kate (about 30) was a breath of fresh air; a truly mature adult female in contrast to the wimpy young bimbos so popular in current fiction. I had a good laugh imaging some alpha jerk attempting to dominate her body & mind; Kate would have kicked his ass and left his bloody corpse for the bears.

The plot introduced all the park residents, an interesting mix characters and Kate's former boss and lover Jack plus her half wolf, half Husky. The murder mystery was engrossing with lots of surprises and twists. I am looking forward to listening to the entire series again.

39 people found this helpful

Overall

5 out of 5 stars

Performance

5 out of 5 stars

Story

5 out of 5 stars

Leiah

03-07-2015

Great Alaskan Character-Driven Mystery

When I noticed A Cold Day For Murder was only $1.99 at Audible, I went back to look at my review here on my site. . . and realized, there isn’t a review here. Hum… Being a HUGE lover of Dana Stabenow, I am somewhat flummoxed that I only have a review for Fire and Ice, which is from her Liam Campbell series, reviewed on site. Well, fiddle. There are nearly 950 reviews on Amazon, so my review won’t make that much difference I suppose – and seeing as how I have over 500 reviews on Amazon (yea!) I am not going to go through pages and pages to see if I wrote reviews before I started SIRTBT. So, here is a short review (Me? A Short Review?! Will wonders never cease?)

Kate Shugak is one of my favorite female characters of all time. Tough and determined, she is also damaged and flawed – in other words, a very real, very human character. Kate is Aleut, raised by her grandmother Ekaterina, a former Tribal Council member and still chief. She grew up in The Park, “twenty million acres, almost four times the size of Denali National Park but with less than one percent of the tourists.” Occupied by Native Aleut and a collection of oddballs and “stay away from them or you will get your ass shot – and you might be dinner as well” types, The Park is a wonderland – and a cold, heartless land where the slightest misstep could mean a brutal death.

The story itself has been well described by others, and you get the gist from the summary. What I want to tell you about is the world of Kate and her tribe. The Aleut have suffered for centuries, first at the hands of the Russians, then the Americans, and Stabenow weaves that story in to her narrative – giving you a good idea of just why the tribal members could really care less that a rich little white boy has gone missing – good riddance to the Outsider with the rich and powerful daddy.

What is truly breathtaking about Stabenow’s writing is her descriptive narrative – her true love for her native land shines out through her writing. And being a huge Marguerite Gavin fan, I am always pulled into all of the Kate stories.

Book Two, A Fatal Thaw, is now on Audible, and I can finally add it to my collection! There are 20 books in the series now (Book 11, The Singing of the Dead, is still not available on 271297Audible, but hopefully whatever is keeping it unavailable will be corrected soon.)

I will warn you – if you like the first book, they are like potato chips – you can’t listen to just one!

28 people found this helpful

Overall

4 out of 5 stars

Performance

2 out of 5 stars

Story

3 out of 5 stars

MDC

11-01-2018

I struggled to get through this one

What made the experience of listening to A Cold Day for Murder the most enjoyable?

It was interesting to learn a little about native/indigenous Alaskans, but the narration almost did me in. The story line didn’t offer any surprises, but it was interesting enough to make me stick with it. The accents affected by the narrator for what was supposed to be native sounded more like a cross between a Bostonian Kennedy and John Wayne’s long drawn out expressions. It was more a distraction and irritation.

Would you be willing to try another book from Dana Stabenow? Why or why not?

I would listen to another Kate Shugak mystery if there was a different narrator.

How did the narrator detract from the book?

Her accents were not good and sounded hokey.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

Absolutely not. My head would have exploded from the narration.

5 people found this helpful

Overall

5 out of 5 stars

Performance

4 out of 5 stars

Story

5 out of 5 stars

Desert Crone

11-12-2015

A review I looked forward to writing!

What made the experience of listening to A Cold Day for Murder the most enjoyable?

Saw this, the first in the Kate Shugak series, on Audible for $1.99, and snapped it up. Even though I'd read the book long ago I decided to start the series over again and I'm so glad I did. The experience of listening to the story, as opposed to reading it, was great fun. I'd forgotten about Ms. Stabenow's sharp wit and her special talent for painting her people and places into in my mind.

Which character – as performed by Marguerite Gavin – was your favorite?

Of course Kate is my favorite character, with Mutt a close second, but each of them leaves an impression. Perhaps the fact that I've read all the books in the series contributes to that -- the feeling that I know them all as old friends with very different strengths.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

I really enjoyed Kate's exchanges with Bobbie and with the bar owner, whose name escapes me because I'm having a senior moment. Interesting. Even though I can't remember the name I can see the bar owner's face in my mind's eye. I love the wit, the dry sarcasm, the literary allusions. The crying comes later with this series, but I chuckled and laughed out loud as I listened yesterday. Not gonna tell you where, but, oh Jack!! I'd forgotten that about you!

Any additional comments?

While I think the narrator did a good job overall, I felt she didn't do justice to the damage Kate's voice had suffered.

4 people found this helpful

Overall

4 out of 5 stars

Performance

4 out of 5 stars

Story

3 out of 5 stars

Patricia

19-03-2012

Hooked by the Alaska connection

A fan of mystery/detective stories all my life, I've been looking for a new (to me) author/series to listen to. The Alaska setting drew me to Dana Stabenow and Kate Shugak. While a little short of compelling, I found the story interesting and the characters well-defined. I found myself drawn into their lives and caring about what happens to them. I'm going to try another in the series.

18 people found this helpful

Overall

4 out of 5 stars

Performance

4 out of 5 stars

Story

4 out of 5 stars

Beatrice

01-09-2014

A Cold Day for Murder

Marguerite Gavin does a great job bring Kate Shugak to like. Kate is a realistic and sympathetic character that I enjoyed reading about. The plot was strong and well developed as was the other characters. There was enough twist and turns to keep you guessing through out the book. I ususally read light and cozy mysteries and this was a bit darker. I spent an entire day listening to it. I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys mysteries.

8 people found this helpful

Overall

3 out of 5 stars

Performance

2 out of 5 stars

Story

3 out of 5 stars

AudioAddict

20-02-2014

Mystery in the Beautiful Alaskan Wilderness

STORY (mystery) - A Cold Day for Murder introduces Kate Shugak, a native Alaskan and previous investigator for the Anchorage DA's Office who has retired to a quiet and peaceful life deep in the Alaskan wilderness. She is asked by Jack, her ex lover/boss, to conduct an investigation into the disappearance of two men who were last seen in her area. What follows is the typical murder investigation you've heard many times, but this one is set in Aleut territory with descriptive imagery of crisp winter mornings, snowmobile rides and encounters with wildlife. The investigation is interesting and the conclusion is somewhat unexpected. I enjoyed the author's treatment of the "past" between Jack and Kate.

PERFORMANCE - I have commented about this narrator before. She has a lovely voice, but she seems to lose her place while reading and then tack on the rest of a sentence as an afterthought. It doesn't happen enough to detract from the experience, but you will notice it when it happens.

OVERALL - This is the first book in the series, but it can stand alone. It is short (5 1/2 hours) and enjoyable, but there's nothing special about it except the Alaskan scenery. There is cursing and some violence, but not a lot. I don't plan to continue the series, except maybe an occasional book that may come on sale.

31 people found this helpful

Overall

5 out of 5 stars

Performance

5 out of 5 stars

Story

5 out of 5 stars

Lynn

09-07-2015

excellent

love the Kate Shugak stories. Read them all now listening to them. Still great, yeah,

2 people found this helpful

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Overall

4 out of 5 stars

Performance

4 out of 5 stars

Story

4 out of 5 stars

Janine

02-06-2014

Fantastic!

This is a standard murder mystery lifted above the pack by excellent writing, unique environment and charismatic characters.

Kate is... irascible, bright, loyal, terse... All kinds of person and it shows in the personal conflict she manages to deal with with grace.

4 people found this helpful

Overall

1 out of 5 stars

Performance

2 out of 5 stars

Story

1 out of 5 stars

K

02-04-2015

Worse than waiting for paint to dry!

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

Awful. I have given up on only two books in my life; and this is the 2nd. I really, really don't care about the method of heating for a shack in a native village in Alaska or how housing is transported, I certainly do not want a 5 minute description of each; just give me the story! Is there one? I'm in chapter 4 and NOTHING that is not on the front cover, has happened.

Dull and boring

What disappointed you about A Cold Day for Murder?

Absolutely no depth to the story or any of the characters. There was no suspense, no build up, no tension, the story just trotted along aimlessly then ended. Had it been longer, I would never have finished it.

What didn’t you like about Marguerite Gavin’s performance?

It was ok. I can't blame the narrator for the boring story.

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from A Cold Day for Murder?

All of it. The story was just too weak. Most of the story was filling, linking together a few uninteresting events.

Any additional comments?

The synopsis is the most interesting part of this book. For a book that was only 5.5 hours, I nearly gave up after 3 hours thinking that the story was going nowhere, but I thought as I was over half way, I would plough through. I had to force myself to listen to the last hour, including the big (or not so big) reveal, so I could write a fair review. Normally when I reach the last hour of a book, I am listening anywhere and everywhere. I listened to the last 10 minutes, purely to delete it and move on to the next book.